08/21/2026
There are moments you dream about for years, and when they finally happen, you realize they were never only yours.
Yesterday was one of those moments.
Standing at the Chicago History Museum stage,sharing the story of my people through my voice and my artwork, I kept thinking about every year of work, every woman I have worked beside, every story I inherited, and every person who believed in me before there was anything visible to believe in.
I will never forget what I felt in that room.
The silence while I spoke.
The tears.
The hugs afterward.
The faces in the audience.
The long applause
The stories people came to share with me once it was over.
And the messages that started before the event and are still coming in now.
That, to me, is what success feels like;
Connection. Recognition. Memory moving from one person to another.
Thank you to Dr. Ali, for choosing me, trusting me, and giving me the space to tell this story in my own voice. Thanks to my friends ;Hadeel and wasif for brainstorming with me.
And to the many people, over so many years, who gave me their time, their belief, their encouragement, their hands, their introductions, their advice, and sometimes simply the words: keep going. Among all , my family 🤍
You helped bring me to that stage.
I dedicate this work first to my father.
A man who carried Nablus with him for his entire life.
A man who wanted to return to the place he came from, but never had the simple freedom of returning to it as home.
And I dedicate it to every woman who works with me in Jordan and Palestine , women whose hands have carried Palestinian memory stitch by stitch, long before any of us stood in a museum to talk about preservation.
This piece belongs to that continuum.
To the people who came before us.
To the people keeping the story alive now.
And to those who will inherit it after us.
I’ll share parts of my speech once I receive the videos.
BUT BEFORE I EXPLAIN MY ARTWORK,
SHARE WITH ME , WHAT DO YOU SEE IN IT ? HOW DID YOU RED IT?